This is going to be an unprecedented campaign year in a few ways, all of which boil down to the obscene amounts of money that outside groups can spend to try to influence the vote in this post-
Citizens United world. The
New York Times has analyzed data provided by Kantar Media/CMAG through mid-July of this year, and finds earlier ad spending, more spending, and more outside spending than ever before. They predict the final price tag for political ad spending for 2014 to reach more than $2 billion.
“They have become a shadow party that’s effectively impossible to dislodge, and they will shape, if not control, the dialogue in key races and therefore nationally,” said Sheila Krumholz, the executive director for the Center for Responsive Politics. “All of this sets the stage for 2016.”
The phenomenon, which is playing out in races across the country, is particularly pronounced in several competitive Senate contests — in places like Alaska, Colorado and North Carolina, among others. In the Senate races alone, the number of political television spots from outside groups is nearly six times as much as it was at the same point in the 2010 cycle. In fact, more political ads from outside groups have already aired during the relatively slow summer period of the 2014 Senate contests—roughly 150,000 spots through mid-July—than ran throughout the entire 2010 Senate elections.
As we've seen so far in this campaign though, all that
money isn't doing a whole hell of a lot to change voter minds. Particularly for the Koch brothers, where their Americans for Prosperity has been pouring millions and millions into races without moving the polling needle a bit. That's not a big surprise to the strategists.
“The irony is that the more political ads air on TV, the more voters tune them out,” said Mark McKinnon, a veteran Republican strategist and ad maker. “It just becomes a white noise. The return on investment is absurd.”
The Kochs will set the pace for spending, the Democrats will try to keep up, and the American electorate will become even more fed up and disgusted with politics than ever, having been subjected to the onslaught of ads that won't ever end. The Supreme Court's decisions in
Citizens United and
McCutcheon don't just destroy democracy by giving an incredibly outsized voice to corporate and obscenely wealthy voters. It also locks people who don't have access to that kind of money out of running for federal office and it multiplies the cynicism and the disengagement of the voters.
At the rate we're going, we're not only going to see campaign spending records fall, we're on track to break another record for low voter turnout in an off-year election.